Happy Monday, loopers! Here are this week’s most exciting new releases (subscribe to our weekly New Music newsletter here)…
1. TAYLOR SWIFT — LOOK WHAT YOU MADE ME DO
If Taylor Swift’s comeback single sounds familiar to you, perhaps it’s the songwriting credit given to Right Said Fred for the remarkable similarity to their 1991 hit I’m Too Sexy. We’re not kidding, if you need further evidence check out this neat video someone posted on Twitter.
Look What You Made Me Do is the lead single to Taylor’s upcoming sixth album, reputation, which is out November 10th and follows up 20104’s 1989.
The track was written with Bleachers and fun.’s Jack Antonoff, who is quickly getting a reputation as songwriter to the stars having recently co-written and produced Lorde’s Melodrama along with recent tracks from Banks, Sia, St. Vincent and ZAYN to name but a few.
Along with lyrics like “I’m sorry, the old Taylor can’t come to the phone right now. Why? Oh, because she’s dead”, the track also throws some shade at Kanye West with the line “I don’t like your tilted stage”. No doubt he’ll have a measured response for her in due course.
Btw, if you’re looking for something Taylor-esque but can’t quite bring yourself to listen to her, you should check out Ryan Adams’ 1989. Yup, he covered her entire album and it’s really quite special.
2. WILLIAM PATRICK CORGAN — AERONAUT
The Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan has shared his first new solo material since his 2005 debut album, TheFutureEmbrace.
Aeronaut, which is released under his full name William Patrick Corgan, is the lead single to Billy’s upcoming Rick Rubin-produced album, Ogilala.
Here’s what Billy had to say about his new album and working with Rubin:
“For as long as I can remember the delineation point between songs I wrote for myself and songs I’d pen for whatever band was something I couldn’t explain. And it remains so, for they all feel quite personal to me, no matter their time or era. The lone difference on songs for Ogilala is that they seemed to want little in the way of adornment.
Having written the songs for voice and guitar, I put myself in Rick’s hands to take the music wherever he’d like. Normally I would have done more, and tinkered more on production, but rather Rick put the onus on me to deliver at a molecular level via live takes. The rest was simply a reaction.”
Ogilala will be out October 13th and is Billy’s first release since 2014’s Monuments To An Elegy album with The Smashing Pumpkins.
3. BECK — DEAR LIFE
Having teased us with sporadic singles for the last 2 years, Beck has finally announced details to his upcoming 13th album, Colors, and shared a new single from it called Dear Life.
Here’s what Beck had to say about his upcoming album:
“For the first year, we were experimenting and there was a lot of trial and error. I was touring constantly while making it, so I was attempting to bring some of that energy back to the studio, which isn’t always the easiest thing to do. ‘Dreams’ was one of the early songs to come along and make me think the idea had legs.
These are complex songs all trying to do two or three things at once. It’s not retro and not modern. To get everything to sit together so it doesn’t sound like a huge mess was quite an undertaking.”
Colors is out October 13th and follows up his Grammy Award-winning (Album Of The Year) 2014 album, Morning Phase, which you might remember for Kanye storming the stage to interrupt his speech (just like he did to Taylor Swift at the 2009 VMAs) because he thought Beyoncé should have won, saying later in an interview: “Beck needs to respect artistry and he should have given his award to Beyoncé”.
Dear Life will be joined on the new album by 2015’s Dreams and last year’s Wow, but sadly won’t include his excellent cover of Elvis Presley’s Can’t Help Falling In Love from earlier this year.
4. FOO FIGHTERS — THE SKY IS A NEIGHBORHOOD
Seattle rock veterans Foo Fighters have announced details to their upcoming 9th album, Concrete and Gold, and shared a new song from it called The Sky Is A Neighborhood.
Just like the album’s recently released lead single, Run, The Sky Is A Neighborhood is accompanied by a video directed by Dave Grohl and, this time, featuring the former Nirvana drummer’s daughters, Violet and Harper.
Concrete and Gold is out September 15th and follows up 2014’s Sonic Highways.
5. THIRTY SECONDS TO MARS — WALK ON WATER
Four years on from their last album (and frontman Jared Leto’s Oscar-winning performance in Dallas Buyers Club), California rockers Thirty Seconds to Mars are back!
Walk On Water is the lead single to their much-anticipated 5th album, which is due later this year and follows up 2013’s LOVE LUST FAITH + DREAMS.
Here’s what Jared Leto had to say about their new single:
“Walk on Water is a song for all of us. It’s a song about freedom, about persistence, about change and about fighting for what you believe in. It is a call to arms but also full of the optimism and hope that is such an integral part of the American Dream.”
The song is accompanied by a video featuring over 10,000 people all recorded on one day: July 4th, 2017. Here’s how they describe it on their YouTube page:
“Everything you are about to see happened on a single day in the United States of America. July 4th, 2017.
Over 10,000 people submitted footage of a single day including 92 of our professional crews. They filmed across the country in all fifty states plus Puerto Rico and D.C. and captured a portrait of this country that is absolutely beautiful, challenging and unforgettable.
A very small selection of that footage you see here. The rest will be part of a documentary film (directed by Jared Leto) that is a companion piece to our brand new album.
The album. The film. The tour.
Coming soon.
Thirty Seconds To Mars.”
If you’re new to Leto’s band and want to hear more, we highly recommend listening to Kings and Queens, The Kill, This Is War, Closer To the Edge and City of Angels.
6. KING KRULE — CZECH ONE
King Krule (aka Archy Marshall, aka Zoo Kid) is back with an excellent new single called Czech One, which is available to stream now and will be released on a split 7" vinyl alongside another new track, called Dum Surfer, on September 13.
Czech One is the first release under his King Krule moniker since his glorious 2013 debut album, 6 Feet Beneath the Moon, and follows up his most recent album, 2015’s A New Place 2 Drown, which was released under his actual name: Archy Marshall.
Archy first burst on to the scene in 2011, when he was just 16(!), with his breathtaking single Out Getting Ribs (it features on his debut King Krule album, but it was originally released under his original stage name, Zoo Kid) and since then he has blown us away with songs like Easy Easy, Rock Bottom, A Lizard State and Neptune Estate, not to mention his recent guest spot on Mount Kimbie’s Blue Train Lines.
Sadly there’s no word yet on his 2nd King Krule album, but fingers crossed he won’t make us wait too long.
7. THE KILLERS — WONDERFUL WONDERFUL
Wonderful Wonderful is the 3rd single and title track to Las Vegas indie-rockers The Killers’ much-anticipated 5th album, Wonderful Wonderful, which is out September 22nd and follows up 2012’s Battle Born.
Here’s what frontman Brandon Flowers had to say about the new album in a recent interview:
“Wonderful Wonderful is shaping up to be our most sonically forward-thinking record yet; an LP bursting with all of the blazing choruses and arena-filling anthems”
If you’re wondering what the band have been up to since 2012, they’ve not been totally idle: last year they released anniversary editions of 2006’s Sam’s Town & 2004’s Hot Fuss and in 2013 they released a Greatest Hits package called Direct Hits. In addition to that Brandon also released his 2nd solo album, The Desired Effect, in 2015.
Wonderful Wonderful will also feature the recently released singles Run For Cover and The Man as well as guest appearances from Mark Knopfler (Dire Straits) and Brian Eno, alongside production from Bleachers and fun.’s Jack Antonoff.
8. AMADOU & MARIAM — LA CONFUSION
Amadou & Mariam, aka the blind couple from Mali, have announced details to their upcoming seventh album, La confusion, and shared its glorious 3rd single and title track.
La confusion will be out September 22nd and will also feature the recently released Filaou Bessame and the super-funky lead single, Bofou Safou. The duo’s last album was 2012’s Folila, which means Music in Bambara.
If you’re new to the couple, who first started recording together in 1983 after three years of marriage, we highly recommend listening to Sabali, their Manu Chao collaboration Sénégal Fast Food, Oh Amadou with Bertrand Cantat, La réalité, or anything from their Dimanche à Bamako or Welcome to Mali albums.
And if you’d like to discover more music from Mali, check out Yere Faga by Oumou Sangaré; Dombolo, Doona and I Play The Kora by Les Amazones d’Afrique; anything from Ali Farka Touré, Toumani Diabaté, Tinariwen (especially their album Elwan, which is one of the best this year), or Damon Albarn’s Mali Music project. Enjoy!
9. FOUR TET — SW9 9SL
Hot on the heels of his excellent recent single, Planet, Keiran Hebden is already back with another funky gem called SW9 9SL, which just happens to be the postcode of London’s world famous Brixton Academy.
SW9 9SL is Hebden’s third Four Tet single this year (he also released Two Thousand and Seventeen in July), so fingers crossed he’s gearing up to release his much-anticipated follow-up to 2015’s Morning / Evening album.
If you like the sound of this, you might also want to check out his recent remixes of Mura Masa’s Love$ick (feat. A$AP Rocky) and The xx’s A Violent Noise, which you can listen to here and here respectively.
10. TENNIS — NO EXIT
It’s been less than 6 months since husband-and-wife duo Alaina Moore and Patrick Riley released their last Tennis album, but they’re already back with a new single called No Exit.
Pitched as “a dance song for my inner nihilist”, here’s how Alaina described the single on the band’s Facebook page:
“I have never related to songs that invoke a carefree, forever young, dance until dawn state of mind. The young-beautiful-fun mantra mostly just reminds me of the opposite. Escapism is shot through with sadness, even on the dance floor. Patrick and I are devoutly mid-tempo songwriters, a fact I wanted to remedy by creating a dancey 120 bpm sort of thing that appeals to my persistent sense of malaise. No Exit is a song I hope you can enjoy regardless of your appetite for fun.”
If you’d like to hear more from the duo, be sure to check out In The Morning I’ll Be Better, Modern Woman and My Emotions Are Blinding from March’s excellent Yours Conditionally.
ALSO WORTH CHECKING OUT THIS WEEK:
- And So I Watch You From Afar — A Slow Unfolding Of Wings
- Anna Of The North — Fire
- Chelsea Wolfe — Offering
- Cults — I Took Your Picture
- Fergie (Black Eyed Peas) — You Already Know (feat. Nicki Minaj)
- Hercules & Love Affair — Rejoice (feat. Rouge Mary)
- Justin Bieber — Friends (feat. BloodPop®)
- Liars — TFCF (album)
- Lindstrøm — Shinin (feat. Grace Hall)
- Metz — Mess Of Wires
- Miguel — Sky Walker (feat. Travis Scott)
- Mogwai — Eternal Panther
- MOURN — Color Me Impressed (The Replacements cover)
- Queens Of The Stone Age — Villains (album)
- Stars — Real Thing
- The War On Drugs — A Deeper Understanding (album) 😍
- Tori Amos — Reindeer King
- Turnover — Good Nature (album)
- Weaves — Walkaway
